***Spoiler FREE*** Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

[naptownskinsfan]

On 4/13/2019 at 11:23 AM, Deadpulse said:

you familiar with the old EU? He wasnt really a clone, but had spare bodies and used the force to basically reinstall his mind and consciousness into new bodies when one died. This is what a lot of die hards think he was referring to when he said in the prequels that the dark side could stop death. Explains why Padme couldnt be saved but that he wasnt lying. 

He was still in his original body when he died on the second Death Star.  The reason the clone bodies continued to fail him was his immense power in the dark side of the Force, as well as genetic tampering at the end.  The reason his goal was to possess Anakin Solo was that someone from the Skywalker bloodline (which was created from the Force itself if you go back to the Plaguies novel) would be able to contain his Force energy.  His ability to use Essence Transfer was key here.  

[naptownskinsfan]

Here are some lengthy thoughts I had on the trailer.  I'm a huge Star Wars fan- I've played just about all of the video games over the years, have all of the EU and current Canon novels, and kept up on the old EU comic series.  So I know quite a bit about the lore and characters.  Feel free to comment, tell me I'm wrong, etc.  While I was not a fan of Episode 8, it feels like they are moving past that movie fairly quickly and I'm definitely excited about the plot points they've given to us.  

1.) Our old buddy Sheev Palpatine is back.....or is he?  

A.) He's in a clone body.  Of course, this is directly out of the old Dark Empire comic series- Palpatine returns with a new Empire and new superweapons, in a clone body. Clones are already canon, so that's one down.  In Dark Empire, Palpatine knew the power of essence transfer, which allowed him to gain access to clone bodies (as his immense dark side power ravaged them and he needed a steady supply).  At the end, his goal was to transfer his life essence to the unborn Anakin Solo, as a descendant of the Skywalker line would be able to handle his dark side power.  

This also sets up the only possible redemption arc for Kylo Ren/Ben Solo, as Palpatine arraying everything so he can take possession of his body would be the only thing that would convince the audience to root for him after his betrayal of Luke and the murder of his father.  

B.) Sheev is a Force Ghost.  However, to what extent he can affect the living realm remains to be seen.  Yoda destroyed the tree on Atch-To with the Force, proving Force Ghosts can affect the living. In the EU, Exar Kun was able to affect the living as a Force Ghost, burning Gantoris from the inside out and flinging Corran Horn around a Massassi Temple at will.  Force Ghosts can be destroyed- this happened to Kun, and multiple times in the MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic.  

C.) Palpatine still exists in another realm.  While I am not 100% up to date with Marvel, this parallels the Quantum Realm, and this also existed in the Legacy of the Force novel series, with the realm called "Beyond Shadows."  Luke Skywalker and the fellow Jedi could not defeat the Force entity Abeloth in the normal universe, and he had to team with Sith Lord Darth Krayt, enter the Beyond Shadows realm to defeat her.  With his master, Darth Plagueis, Palpatine delved into the secrets of life, and could indeed have found that another realm exists.  

An added bonus is that, while in Beyond Shadows, Luke could commune with his wife and his fallen nephew Jacen Solo.  So this adds a whole new level of intrigue if they go this route.   

D.) The laughing is from a recording from one of the Operation: Cinder monitors from Battlefront II.  This is the troll option/potential red herring from JJ Abrams.  

2.) The Death Star remains.  The remains had to go somewhere.  This planet could actually be Endor, or another planet in the system, or flung to other star systems.  The explosion was immensely powerful, and the writers can essentially decide how powerful.  From the new Battlefront II, we know that some debris made it onto the forest moon of Endor, but not nearly enough of it (and from Return of the Jedi, the Ewok village was unharmed.) . Also from BFII, the Yavin IV map takes place after the destruction of the first Death Star, and the area around the Grand Temple was free of debris.  Either way, I think this is going to play a key role in the movie.  

3.) At the beginning, what planet is Rey on?  From the lack of starship debris, we can rule out Jakku.  That leaves only one well-known desert planet that we know about, and with Skywalker in the title of the movie, this planet is assuredly Tatooine.  Something was left for Rey on Tatooine, or she may be investigating the virgin birth of Anakin Skywalker.  

Of course, I'm still interested in knowing Rey's heritage.  The tagline teases that she is a Skywalker, though this could also be about Kylo Ren/Ben, if they are indeed setting up a redemption storyline.  I'm also very interested in knowing who Snoke is, though with the return of Sheev, they may be trying to make us forget about him.......or did Palpatine take over his body?  

One interesting plot point about the defeat of the Empire at Jakku from the canon novel trilogy Aftermath is that Palpatine ordered a large amount of Sith artifacts dumped into the planet's core as part of the operation after his death.  It is never explained why.  Did this start a Sith ritual designed to bring him back to life, or something along these lines?  I'm going to guess so, but how they go about things after that is anyone's guess.  

[naptownskinsfan]

On 4/13/2019 at 11:02 AM, DingoLadd said:

Oh not again..... That's how we got Luuke and Luuuke. 

Sideous is more than likely just a vision/flashback/one of those battlefront 2 droids with his face. I like Ian but if they do the whole "HE WAS ALIVE THIS WHOLE TIME AS A CLONE THING" like c'mon. 

Also he did, he built an entire backup plan to destroy the empire (because if he died, they also deserved to die) and form the first order with his chosen remnants of the empire.

I'm still grasping with the significance of the ancient Sith artifacts being dumped into Jakku's core in the Aftermath trilogy.  That's not a coincidence that Sideous wanted to cull the weak from the Empire's ranks in one final last stand, while at the same time causing what should be a massive disruption in the Force.  

[naptownskinsfan]

On 4/12/2019 at 10:46 PM, thrILL! said:

I think if Palpatine actually created another force-sensitive offspring like he supposedly did with Anakin, and this time it's Rey, it flips the dynamic from the first 6 movies.  Instead of the good son of a legendaryJedi (Luke-Anakin) defeating Palpatine's Sith offspring (Vader), Palpatine's good offspring (Rey) will defeat the Sith son of a legendary Jedi (Leia).  This is actually really cool.  

*EDIT- that actually wouldn't work as she's too young. Oh well.  The dynamic is still cool tho.

But I'd still rather Rey be a nobody.  Not every Jedi HAS to be a Skywalker.  That was one of the many great things about TLJ; it showed us anybody anywhere might be strong with the force.  And the easy answers Rey (and disgruntled viewers) were looking for was for her to fit in somewhere specific.  But it makes no sense that she's Luke's and being Ben's sister is too contrived at this point.  I think the Palpatine angle might have legs.  Just no clones please.

In the Plagueis novel, both Plagueis and Sideous were in meditations attempting to bend the Force to their will, which was accomplished (the mention of the Sith discovering the Jedi's weakness is key of this in The Phantom Menace.)  Sidious left the planet they were on, as he was an active senator and is absence would be missed, as Plagueis dived further into this experiment.  At one point, the Force actively fought back, and left Plagueis for a time.  This is when Anakin was born.  Plagueis was on Coruscant when Anakin was presented to the Jedi Council, and was terrified of his existence, saw a vision of Darth Vader and ordered Sidious to have Maul kill Qui-Gon Jinn.  Sidious was apparently unaware of the vision of Vader and continued his pursuit of Anakin as a future apprentice.   So I don't think Palpatine knew how to create life at the time Anakin turned, but over the next 20 years could he have found something similar?  Perhaps. 

[The Gnat]

I was pleased with that trailer, hadn't watched it before leaving work on Friday. But I thought that is looked like it was a lot of fun, and I'm hoping that it'll wrap up this saga nicely. I think that it would work well to wrap up Star Wars first three trilogies and we can get on to something that feels newer.

[JBURGE]

10 hours ago, naptownskinsfan said:

A.) He's in a clone body.  Of course, this is directly out of the old Dark Empire comic series- Palpatine returns with a new Empire and new superweapons, in a clone body. Clones are already canon, so that's one down.  In Dark Empire, Palpatine knew the power of essence transfer, which allowed him to gain access to clone bodies (as his immense dark side power ravaged them and he needed a steady supply).  At the end, his goal was to transfer his life essence to the unborn Anakin Solo, as a descendant of the Skywalker line would be able to handle his dark side power.  

This also sets up the only possible redemption arc for Kylo Ren/Ben Solo, as Palpatine arraying everything so he can take possession of his body would be the only thing that would convince the audience to root for him after his betrayal of Luke and the murder of his father.  

Great big post btw, I just have to make a comment on this. Can you imagine that the arc ending for this movie is Ben killing Palpatine to save either Rey's corruption or save Rey? Would make this trilogy an entirely worthless copy of the OG ahaha

[naptownskinsfan]

9 hours ago, JBURGE said:

Great big post btw, I just have to make a comment on this. Can you imagine that the arc ending for this movie is Ben killing Palpatine to save either Rey's corruption or save Rey? Would make this trilogy an entirely worthless copy of the OG ahaha

Yeah, the redemption arc is a stretch, and that wouldn't be how I would pull it off.  If they go this route, Palpatine has to be immensely powerful and require the two of them to work together.  Not one saving the other.  They already did the copycat game with The Force Awakens. 

[thrILL!]

On 4/14/2019 at 8:34 PM, naptownskinsfan said:

2.) The Death Star remains.  The remains had to go somewhere.  This planet could actually be Endor, or another planet in the system, or flung to other star systems.  The explosion was immensely powerful, and the writers can essentially decide how powerful.  From the new Battlefront II, we know that some debris made it onto the forest moon of Endor, but not nearly enough of it (and from Return of the Jedi, the Ewok village was unharmed.) . Also from BFII, the Yavin IV map takes place after the destruction of the first Death Star, and the area around the Grand Temple was free of debris.  Either way, I think this is going to play a key role in the movie.  

3.) At the beginning, what planet is Rey on?  From the lack of starship debris, we can rule out Jakku.  That leaves only one well-known desert planet that we know about, and with Skywalker in the title of the movie, this planet is assuredly Tatooine.  Something was left for Rey on Tatooine, or she may be investigating the virgin birth of Anakin Skywalker.  

There's another explanation.  

Palpatine survived.  He survived Vader tossing him down the shaft.  We only saw an explosive blast shoot up the shaft. It could have been Palpatine blasting something as he fell with his bolts.  That's the wreckage of the Death Star in the teaser.  You're right it looks to be Endor or possibly a different nearby moon.  Has Palpatine been living in the wreckage of the Death Star for all these years?

If he created Anakin, he could have created Rey too.  Maybe she was created years later when Palpatine healed sufficiently or built up enough power to pull it off.  That would adjust accordingly for the timeline and Rey's age.  She could've been created on Endor and then taken to Jakku.  Dropped off by her "parents."  

She could be a clone of Anakin.  

 

"Why does everyone want to go back to Jakku?"   I think it's Jakku, not Tattoine.

Edited April 17, 2019 by thrILL!

[DingoLadd]

14 minutes ago, thrILL! said:

There's another explanation.  

Palpatine survived.  He survived Vader tossing him down the shaft.  We only saw an explosive blast shoot up the shaft. It could have been Palpatine blasting something as he fell with his bolts.  That's the wreckage of the Death Star in the teaser.  You're right it looks to be Endor or possibly a different nearby moon.  Has Palpatine been living in the wreckage of the Death Star for all these years?

If he created Anakin, he could have created Rey too.  Maybe she was created years later when Palpatine healed sufficiently or built up enough power to pull it off.  That would adjust accordingly for the timeline and Rey's age.  She could've been created on Endor and then taken to Jakku.  Dropped off by her "parents."  

She could be a clone of Anakin.  

 

"Why does everyone want to go back to Jakku?"   I think it's Jakku, not Tattoine.

Like I get people want to go crazy with fan theories and all, but the simplest answer is almost always the correct one.

Palpatine has a cameo, that's all we know. 

[Calvert28]

On 4/15/2019 at 4:56 PM, naptownskinsfan said:

Yeah, the redemption arc is a stretch, and that wouldn't be how I would pull it off.  If they go this route, Palpatine has to be immensely powerful and require the two of them to work together.  Not one saving the other.  They already did the copycat game with The Force Awakens. 

Yea and it's not like Ben would be the one to save Rey. No way in hell Kennedy would let that happen.

In either ending I think it would make for a better ending if Rey died a martyr with Ben possibly dying one too.

 

[Calvert28]

48 minutes ago, thrILL! said:

There's another explanation.  

Palpatine survived.  He survived Vader tossing him down the shaft.  We only saw an explosive blast shoot up the shaft. It could have been Palpatine blasting something as he fell with his bolts.  That's the wreckage of the Death Star in the teaser.  You're right it looks to be Endor or possibly a different nearby moon.  Has Palpatine been living in the wreckage of the Death Star for all these years?

If he created Anakin, he could have created Rey too.  Maybe she was created years later when Palpatine healed sufficiently or built up enough power to pull it off.  That would adjust accordingly for the timeline and Rey's age.  She could've been created on Endor and then taken to Jakku.  Dropped off by her "parents."  

She could be a clone of Anakin.  

 

"Why does everyone want to go back to Jakku?"   I think it's Jakku, not Tattoine.

I think he's just haunting it like a force ghost. Or Rey touches something he touched and she hears the memory of his laughter in the Death Star.

[INbengalfan]

1 hour ago, Calvert28 said:

I think he's just haunting it like a force ghost. Or Rey touches something he touched and she hears the memory of his laughter in the Death Star.

Or Disney took a page from the Russo brothers and spiced up the trailer with red herrings

[navysaintsfan]

I'll be 100% honest...if Rey turns out to be a Skywalker I'll be so disappointed.

[theJ]

32 minutes ago, INbengalfan said:

Or Disney took a page from the Russo brothers and spiced up the trailer with red herrings

That's the simplest explanation, and probably the correct one.

[D82]

1 hour ago, navysaintsfan said:

I'll be 100% honest...if Rey turns out to be a Skywalker I'll be so disappointed.

It really wouldn't bother me. Though I'd prefer her parents be some other Force sensitive characters, even ones we don't know.